Contentar Best movie of this year hands down!

Cleveronix A different way of telling a story

AshUnow This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

Yazmin Close shines in drama with strong language, adult themes.

WakenPayne Okay as someone who has completed the first game and about three quarters of the second one that as a narrative the universe is very well thought through, the characters are very interesting - almost to a point of them feeling like real people and while the stories are simplistic, there is still a lot to work with. When I saw this anime, I bought it. I wondered how it can possibly be screwed up... Well, I have seen SOME video game to anime transitions that worked (like Resident Evil and Halo)... but this isn't one of them.Okay so the plot, after a bunch of characters which I have never seen nor heard about save a Human colony from The Krogan Blood Pack they stay and upgrade their defenses. 2 years later they find an unknown alien artifact and when they return they find that The Collectors are trying to take the humans away from the colony.Onto what I didn't like. These characters are some of the most generic washed up characters I have ever seen. I mean in Halo Forward Unto Dawn I didn't mind it as much because - It's Halo, that's an expectation. But I had no reason to care at all. I mean Vega's defining character is "I wish I could be like Shepard", that and the tools used to care about the colony - Sorry the little kid he befriends and her mother. I mean if the kid had more of a character then I might have cared about what happened at the ending but I didn't.The other complaints are that the animation is sub-par at best (at worst it's the frame rate changing), The movie borrows twists used in the game and plays them out in exactly the same way (when the only people I'm sure who would watch it is fans of the game) and that's around about it.Onto what I enjoyed - The last 10 minutes. I really enjoyed how it gets across the importance of choice and how sometimes these characters are between a rock and a hard place. I also think while the voice acting isn't anything on the games - it's decent enough and The Collectors is also something I think the movie does well. And the first action scene in the movie (The one where Vega and his squad to tactical maneuvers to outwit the enemy) is very well done.If you are a fan of the video games, there is a small chance you'll like this. If you aren't a fan of the video games then this will have you saying "What? Who? Why? Huh? OKAY WHAT JUST HAPPENED!" I admit that the first and last 10 minutes of this movie are really well done. I just think that there are a couple of things that falls short. If it had characters from the original Mass Effect and just Chronicled the 2 years in-between games then I would have enjoyed this a lot more.

Rob_Taylor So, let me start out by saying I'm a Mass Effect fan. I've played all the games and I count the series as one of the best interactive gaming experiences going.So, quite what Electronic Arts were thinking when they farmed out this movie concept to Funimation is beyond me. I'm not even sure if they even had a target demographic beyond "Mass Effect fans".The animation and artwork is of poor quality, really. Certainly sub-par for a franchise like Mass Effect. I can only guess Funimation did this on the cheap. There are some scenes - shuttle flights etc, where the animation is much, much better than that used on the characters, which is a little puzzling.Whatever happened, the animation is uneven, jerky, and very much in the (entirely inappropriate) style of anime that characterizes much of Japanese animation. And old style anime, too, not the more modern style.This makes the movie hard to watch. I had it on in the background whilst I was doing other things, and that helped a lot. Listening, with the occasional glance up at the screen, made it seem better than if I plonked myself down in front of the screen and watched avidly.Voice acting is somewhere between poor and acceptable. The same actor voices Vega in this movie as did the voice work for the game (ME3), but I really couldn't tell it was him until the credits rolled, so make of that what you will.Plotwise, the story is set between the events of ME1 and ME2, with the story being a rehash of some of the events of ME2, involving the Collectors and such. It's relatively simple and, for the most part, does its job competently.However, it is formulaic and would be forgotten if not for its one saving grace - the ending.Having sat through an hour and a half of poorly animated film, our hero (James Vega) is faced with an impossible choice. A personal no-win scenario that even Kirk would blink uncertainly at. Save the hundreds of colonists, or save the girl with the information that could turn the tide of battle. He can't do both, seemingly. I admit, I expected some miraculous macguffin, or Deus Ex Machina to allow both, but, to its eternal credit, this story doesn't let that happen. Vega makes his choice, sacrificing the colonists so that the information the girl has can be utilized.And that brings me to the delicious irony of this story.Those that have followed the Mass Effect games already know about the terrible ending that was foisted off on the fans at the end of ME3. The game itself was reasonable, but the ending sucked. With Paragon Lost, the movie as a whole was weak but it was redeemed by the no-win ending to a great degree. Looking at the writer of this movie, who had nothing to do with ME3, I'm forced to wonder what sort of ending he might have come up with for the game series. It seems he knows what he's doing in that regard.Anyway, irony aside, Paragon Lost is a poor movie, mostly down to the bad animation and some dodgy voice work. It's worth seeing it once, if you are a fan of Mass Effect, but it won't be on anyone's rewatch list. If you hated ME3's endings, stick with ME:PL until the bitter-sweet end and wonder what might have been.SUMMARY: Terribly ironic addition to the Mass Effect universe, marred by shoddy animation and dodgy voice acting. It does have a good ending (at least in my book!) which redeems it somewhat, but it will never be watched more than once.

oli-reed Anyone who is a fan of the Mass Effect games and has played the last one is already familiar with James Vega and is somewhat aware of the story of his lost platoon. Though James Vega is by no means a favourite character of mine, he still is a fun and worthy addition to the amazingly diverse roster of characters offers up in the ground-breaking game series. However, this spin-off animation does not live up at all with the original three games cinematic style, characters, story or story telling. I know it is a slightly difficult comparison to compare a game to an animation, however when a feature that has to focus more on combat than story has a more fuller narrative then you know it is bad. Even compared to the third game - an ending that is regarded as one of the worst game endings ever feels more satisfying than this.The animation felt the laziest aspect of the whole production and offered nothing special to fans. When the main character's neck is bigger than his head then you know how poor quality the animation is.Not only is the animation lacking, but the characters provided for the viewer to be emotionally invested in were two dimensional and bland for the most part, not forgetting some very dodgy voice acting and impressions of old characters, as well as a PAINFULLY obvious 'bad-guy'. Not forgetting massive plot holes e.g. why didn't Essex go after the asari and save her with biotics, or why was it so easy to get out of the pod chambers, even when they weren't paralysed).There were some parts I liked and the end felt somewhat satisfying and the beginning and end felt reasonably satisfying, however from a name this good, fans and newcomers should justifiably expect something more. I know this is based on a comic, so the production cannot be blamed entirely, however this could have been a lot more of an exciting tale if executed directly. As well as this, why they chose this piece to do as an animation is beyond me. They could have just as easily animated a satisfying alternative ending to the series (although that would be hard to execute well), or create a fresh narrative from the plentiful world that mass effect has created (pre, post, or parallel to Shepard). I would have personally liked them to create a narrative from the Rachni Wars.OVERALL LAZY AND DISAPPOINTING WITH THE POTENTIAL IT HAD

ode_for_cruelty21 As a huuuuge fan of Mass Effect and its universe/lore, i was pretty damn skeptical going in to this movie. Pretty much anything i saw in the trailers beforehand (especially the cheap animation) did not impress me one bit. I'm glad to say most of my biggest fears were in vain. Well, the animation isn't exactly Studio Ghibli -like eye candy, but i got used to it pretty quickly.My other main concern was main protagonist, James Vega, who's probably the most boring and generic character in the games. Or at least out of your squadmates. They manage to make him likable though, someone you could really root for. The voice acting wasn't as top notch though, and the same goes for pretty much every character. Still, it is adequate.What it comes to the most important thing, which is of course the story, it's quite... Good! It's structured kinda like a handful of missions and cut scenes in the game, and you can almost see in the eyes of your mind how these events would be handled in a game. The dialogue should get a couple of chuckles out of ME-fans, and the ending is actually quite moving, yet fitting. The games are all about big choices, after all.I could nitpick on some minor things, like the Krogans who didn't look much like Krogans and so forth, but i don't really feel like it. It was faithful enough to keep me well satisfied.If you're a fan of Mass Effect, at least give Paragon Lost a chance.